Being naughty (spoilers)

[bluesqueak]

Are.........................

We...........................

Still........................

On...........................

Spoiler......................

Space?.......................

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


Kneasy:
> > DD requested Sevvy to kill him
> > Nasty!Snape was actually Snape!DM, helping to protect Harry
> 
Catlady:
> As I said, not necessarily. The straightest surface reading is that
> your theory of Revenge!Snape, A Very Good Hater!Snape, is correct,
> except the detail that it was someone other than Florence & Sprog he
> was revenging. Revenge!Snape protected Harry for the sake of his
> revenge, not out of loyalty to DD, and probably was pleased when he
> learned that killing HP was part of the plan. 
> 

Uh, no. Sorry. It's certainly a possible reading, because Canon!Snape 
could probably garner more BAFTA's than Alan Rickman if he'd only 
gone into acting instead of silly wand waving. But the Pensieve 
memory has Snape *looking* horrified and behaving as if he's 
horrified at finding HP's death is plan A.

So the straightest surface reading is that he is horrified, not 
pleased. ;-) 

> However, granted that Pensieve memories are an objective report, 
> there is nothing in Snape's Pensieve memories that PROVES he wasn't 
> lying to DD in all those conversations about almost everything 
> except his attachment to Lily. Snape is savvy enough that he could 
> have used his feeling for Lily, a real desire and a fake intention 
> to save her life, to get in good with DD for the sake of spying on 
> DD to serve LV. And when LV dissolved, he kept using it to stay out 
> of Azkaban. And when LV returned, he sincerely returned to LV's 
> service. Convenient for him that the first place that LV's commands 
> and DD's commands to him differed is DD's last command, to push HP 
> to die to kill LV. 
> And he never intended to obey DD's last command, but he never 
> expected LV to kill him while he was still useful and a loyal 
> servant. In that surprised moment, he instantly needed to avenge 
> *himself* on LV, and thought of how to do it -- by telling HP how 
> to destroy LV. Pretty quick thinking, especially for a dying man.

You could argue that, yes. That's the thing about creating a 
character who's a great double agent and spy; you can't ever prove 
his real, real motives. 

But if you do go for ESE!Snape, you're going for a one-dimensional 
Snape - when we've just been given the most gloriously ambiguous and 
conflicted character ever to grace the pages of a book supposedly for 
children. ESE!Snape isn't half as much fun as the Snape of the 
surface reading (did I just say that?).

I think the clue to JKR's view of Snape's character came in HBP; in 
Spinner's end she has a bit of description that goes 'the two women 
were running between patches of light and deep darkness'. And in The 
Prince's Tale, that's what we see. From Snape's expression on first 
looking at Lily, 'undisguised greed' to Snape calling her a mudblood 
and then camping outside Gryffindor to apologise; he's someone with 
good and bad impulses mixed. Lily brings out both the best and the 
worst in him. She brings out the worst in his jealousy of James, and 
his willingness to let her husband and child die if only that means 
he can have her. She brings out the best because he's willing to 
protect a child he doesn't even like - for her sake. Snape's love is 
both destroying and saving. LOLLIPOPS turns out to be resolutely non-
sappy. 

The Prince's Tale chapter is one which is going to repay reading, I 
think. It's very well written; for one thing there's seventeen years 
of Snape's moral and emotional development shown in a series of brief 
scenes (a sign that JKR studied more than Christie's plots - Christie 
was a mistress of the one-sentence character description that implied 
reams). And there is a justification for it which is more than 'the 
reader wants to know'. Both Snape and Harry complain about 
Dumbledore's habit of keeping secrets; when Snape finally has the 
opportunity, he does *not* give Harry just what he 'needs to know'. 
He gives him the truth about his connection with Lily and Harry. And 
he gives him the good and the bad about himself.

Kneasy:
> > Slytherin House isn't abolished
> Catlady:
> Yes, whatever happened to House Unity?

Given that the British still intensely disliked the Germans during my 
childhood, which was 20+ years after WW2, I reckon JKR decided people 
actually liking Slytherins was going to take a bit longer 
than 'nineteen years later' {g}. Even today, you'll hear the 
occasional comment. 

> > Puppetmaster!DD
> 
> As I said, not necessarily. There's no new evidence that he planned
> even one little thing in this plot before he heard the Prophecy, and
> very few new hints that he planned it before James & Lily died. No 
> new canon that he arranged for James & Lily to die. MAGIC 
> DISHWASHER, yes.(Pip, I apologize for disbelieving it all these 
> years.) Puppetmaster, no.

::Bows:: Yes, the old DISHWASHER managed to survive, what, four 
Hurricane Jo's with remarkable aplomb and only some smashed 
crockery.  And DD really *was* a manipulative old plotter, wasn't he? 
But I agree, there's no canon in DH that he arranged for James & Lily 
to die. I do note that DD never mentions the name of the new Secret 
Keeper, just that James & Lily trusted 'the wrong person'. Is this 
ambiguity deliberate, I ask myself?


> > Sirius really was a plonker
> 
> While I was surprised that Regulus drank the poison himself, I saw 
> no new evidence that Sirius was a plonker. I still love him (and 
> Remus, and DDM!Snape), and I was surprised and deeply touched that 
> his love of Muggle motorcycles was sincere, not just one flying 
> motorcycle to impress people with.
>
I was impressed with Ron taking and passing (even if he cheated) a 
Muggle driving test. That is possibly a small sign that the WW is 
becoming more integrated into the Muggle world; some at least are 
following Muggle laws and using Muggle methods.

Pip!Squeak